485. Message From the President’s Special Assistant for National
Security Affairs (Bundy) to President Johnson1
Washington, October 29, 1965.
The following message from Prime Minister Wilson arrived here at 2 a.m. It asks for a personal
plea from you to Prime Minister Smith in Southern Rhodesia. I have
talked with Acting Secretary Ball, and he and I fully agree that we cannot reject
Wilson’s request. We further
agree on a draft message to Smith, which follows the Wilson message to the President. The
language of this draft carefully follows language we have used in
earlier non-Presidential messages and contains no new position.
Wilson’s preferred time for
this answer had already arrived when his message reached us, so we have
decided to hold this until you could deal with it this morning.
Text of Wilson message to the
President follows:
Attachment2
Personal for McGeorge Bundy from Wright.
Following is text of a message for President from Prime Minister
which will be coming to you via the Embassy.
Message Begins:
I was most grateful for the message which Secretary Rusk sent to me with your authority
for delivery to Mr. Smith if I thought it
helpful.
- 2.
- After three days of intensive discussion here,3 with the government, with the African
Nationalist leaders, Nkomo and Sithole, and with every
representative body of opinion including the churches, business,
the financial community and the defeated opposition, not to
mention ex-Prime Ministers of Rhodesia, I have come to the
reluctant conclusion that a message from you delivered through
me would not have the necessary impact.
- 3.
- The situation is bleak. Although I have tried every method of
persuasion the African Nationalists are prepared neither to work
together nor to make any move from their extreme position to any
extent necessary to win even a breathing space. The government
are impervious to argument and are collectively like a suicide
on a windowsill waiting to jump. Moderate European opinion is
paralyzed by a sense of helplessness before impending doom, and
subject to personal intimidation which saps their will to
oppose. The government is manipulating the organs of publicity
such as radio and television although the press is still
free.
- 4.
- Although I have the sensation of witnessing the final act of a
Greek tragedy, there is just the slightest chance that
catastrophe may be avoided. I have today pulled out all the
stops in working on Smith and have put to him a reasonable
alternative to a U.D.I. which no rational man could refuse,
namely a Royal commission. The terms of reference would be to
seek the highest common factor of agreement between all shades
of opinion in Rhodesia on the terms for independence. In these
circumstances, a message direct from you to Mr.
Smith delivered through your Consul
General here in Salisbury would be of infinitely greater value
than a message delivered through me. To make its maximum impact
it should preferably be delivered by 9:00 a.m. Salisbury time,
tomorrow Friday. Since I have found some doubt here in Salisbury
not only in government circles, but also more generally, about
the attitude of the United States to a U.D.I., I hope that your
message might state your position in unequivocal terms. Even
this may not do the trick: but when I think of the consequences
of failure to deter this suicidal government, I believe that no
means of pressure should be neglected.
Message Ends.
